Spotlight: Shrug by Lisa Braver Moss

Shrug: A Novel
written by Lisa Braver Moss
published by She Writes Press, 2019

find it here: (affiliate links) Barnes & Noble, Amazon, iBooks, Target, Walmart, Kobo, Book Depository, Goodreads

About the book – from Goodreads: Martha Goldenthal isn’t your typical 1960s Berkeley radical. Her rebellion isn’t sex, drugs, or rock ’n’ roll—it’s doing well at Berkeley High and planning for college. Her father, Jules, is a raging batterer who, because of his own insecurities, hates academia. Not that her off-the-rails mother, Willa, is much better. Meanwhile, Jules’s classical record store, located directly across the street from the U.C. Berkeley campus, is ground zero for riots and tear gas. No wonder Martha has a nervous tic—a shrug of the shoulder.

Preoccupied with the family situation and barely able to concentrate, Martha plods along in school and somehow manages to achieve. But her parents’ hideous divorce, the loss of her father’s record store and livelihood, a heartless eviction from the family home, and an unlikely custody case wind up putting Martha in Jules’s care. Can she stand up to her father and do the one thing she’s sure she must—go to college?

With its running “soundtrack” of classical recordings and rock music and its vivid scenes of Berkeley at its most turbulent, Shrug is the absorbing, harrowing, and ultimately uplifting story of one young woman’s journey toward independence.

 

“As persuasive as the memoirs Educated and The Glass Castle, Shrug yanks at the heartstrings… I felt white-knuckled empathy for the tough and fragile Martha.”
– Carolyn McVickar Edwards, author of Return of the Light and The Storyteller’s Goddess

“A book that slowly creeps up on you before grabbing you by the throat and demanding that you pay attention. I highly recommend this read.”
– Grant Leishman, Readers’ Favorite

“Rich with colorful characters, vivid descriptions and subtle insights… Moss’s graceful prose brings you along on this poignant coming-of-age journey with pathos and humor.”
– Rifka Kreiter, author of Home Free: Adventures of a Child of the Sixties

“Moss takes achingly relatable teenage angst and subjects it to parents so off-the-rails that the explosive Berkley antics around the Vietnam War ‘outside’ pale next to the domestic horror of the war at home—and then sets it to music. A book with a voice for generations, from Boomers to their grandchildren.”
– Rita Dragonette, author of The Fourteenth of September

“Gripping from beginning to end, this beautifully written work is impossible to put down.”
– The BookLife Prize

 

About the author: Lisa Braver Moss is the author of Shrug (She Writes Press, Aug. 13, 2019). She is a writer specializing in family issues, health, Judaism, and humor. Her work has appeared in Parents, Tikkun, Lilith, the Huffington Post and more. Moss is the author of the novel “The Measure of His Grief” (Notim Press, 2010). Her nonfiction book credits include “Celebrating Family: Our Lifelong Bonds with Parents and Siblings” (Wildcat Canyon Press, 1999) and, as a co-author, “The Mother’s Companion: A Comforting Guide to the Early Years of Motherhood” (Council Oak Books, 2001). She is also the co-author of “Celebrating Brit Shalom” (Notim Press, 2015), the first-ever book of ceremonies and music for Jewish families opting out of circumcision. Moss is a survivor of childhood domestic violence and grew up in Berkeley, California. She lives with her husband in nearby Piedmont. They have two grown sons.

 

 

 

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** This post first appeared on Every Free Chance Books (everyfreechance.com) on August 13, 2019.